4 minutes
Leveraging artificial intelligence to create personalized, interactive learning leads to employee engagement and retention.
From AI-based chatbots to the virtual assistants on our smartphones, artificial intelligence is prevalent in our daily lives.
Our professional lives aren’t untouched by the presence of AI either. The artificial intelligence revolution is sweeping across all industries and businesses, and the technology is present everywhere we look.
How is AI transforming learning and development?
The learning and development landscape needs to keep pace with these revolutionary technological changes. Employees today need to be quick learners to excel and propel your business forward, and technology can help with that. AI has the potential to help drive employee engagement, equip staff members to build a killer sales pipeline, boost workforce productivity and ultimately increase your organization’s profitability.
Here are four ways AI-driven solutions are changing L&D.
1. Personalized Learning for Employees
A one-size-fits-all approach no longer works. Artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms are being leveraged to personalize the learning experiences of each employee. To do this, the specific needs of each learner must be understood and used to drive the development of personalized training modules. These L&D solutions are curated to meet the individual’s pace of learning and learning style.
Collection of learning data and the application of analytics can be instrumental in understanding learning patterns and behavior. Using historical data, predictive analytics and user data analysis, organizations can create intelligent, intuitive L&D programs that adapt to the individual learning patterns of employees. AI can make this analysis and adaptation happen in real-time.
2. A Focus on Microlearning
The time available for an employee to focus on learning and development in addition to his or her regular work is limited. “Microlearning” focuses on breaking down long-form learning content into bite-sized pieces that employees can consume on the go.
But having access to bite-sized, easy-to-retain content is just half the solution. The true power of microlearning can be unlocked when AI is used to make sense of the chaos and clutter of available knowledge resources. Algorithms can be used to make relevant recommendations for courses that best meet the individual learning need, track progress and ensure that employee productivity is maintained while learning.
Microlearning will propel the modernization of an organization’s learning management system, with a content strategy focused on consumption of smaller chunks of easily consumable content.
3. Interactive Learning Sessions
Learning on the go through AI-powered mobile learning apps has the potential to replace conventional L&D sessions. Mobile apps can also make learning fun, and the best part is that the sessions are available to employees regardless of their location.
Gamification and the use of such techniques as augmented and virtual reality result in a mobile learning system that is interactive, provides personalized course recommendations on the basis of individual data, and can incorporate chatbots to resolve common queries that employees might have—all with the end goal of boosting engagement.
The future has the potential to take interactive learning to another level, with the advent of virtual training assistants and virtual mentoring. These features can harness such AI capabilities as natural language processing and analytics algorithms to make even better recommendations, automatically track progress and design L&D programs aimed at individual learning.
4. Investing in the Learning Experience
According to the LinkedIn workplace learning report, 68% of employees prefer to learn at work and 58% prefer to do it at their own pace. Additionally, 94% of employees would stay longer at a company if it invested in their learning and development. With the traditional workspace slowly transitioning to a gig economy—a workforce comprised of professionals who are increasingly leaving their traditional jobs to work as independent contractors, organizations need to heavily invest in learning and development programs to retain talent.
Credit unions need to infuse their organizations with a culture of continuous learning, and AI-driven solutions are a bias-free method for implementing this transformation. While the ideas are still in the nascent stage as of now, the advancements in the field of artificial intelligence over the past couple years herald a bright future for the application of this technology in the learning and development realm.
Dr. Vinati Kamani writes about emerging technology and its application across industries for Arkenea, Carrollton, Texas. She is an avid reader and self-proclaimed bibliophile. When Kamani is not at her desk penning articles or reading up on recent trends, she can be found travelling to remote places and soaking up new cultural experiences.
